


i got chains & you got wings

by RaindropsOnRoses



Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: F/M, mentions of rape/non-con, no explicit rape/non-con
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-06
Updated: 2017-01-06
Packaged: 2018-09-15 06:59:44
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,242
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9224096
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RaindropsOnRoses/pseuds/RaindropsOnRoses
Summary: "The nightmares didn't let up. It was as if they'd finally been unlocked from a dark part of Rey's mind. She wondered whether her meeting of Ren, the feeling of being overpowered and helpless had triggered the return of the memories. She considered asking Luke but didn't want to explain what her nightmares were about and the possible connection. The difference had been that she had been able to fight Ren off."Rey is having nightmares and Finn is there is listen.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Just saying at the start that there is no explicit rape in this work, just allusions and mentions. However, I thought it only fair to give everyone fair warning in case it was upsetting to anyone. This is a result of me meditating on what Rey's life on Jakku was like and what harsh realities she would have faced.

The night Finn kissed her for the first time was the first night she dreamt of the man she'd hoped to forget. Long after her lips had stopped tingling and her breath had evened out, Rey settled into her cot in the bunkers of the resistance and tried to sleep with thoughts of her friend (Friend? Boyfriend? Lover? Kissing buddy?) in her head. Like ghosts who preyed on happiness, fed off her joy, the nightmares swept aside images of Finn's smiling face and his blush after kissing her and replaced them with something far more sinister. 

Rey had been 16, or that was the best guess without remembering her birthday. Puberty was beginning to wane for the young brunette, her figure becoming more womanly despite the starvation and lack of flattering fashion and her features becoming less childlike. Even she could feel the gaze of her usual scavenger compatriots was turning into a different kind of predatory. 

Of course, any man who tried anything got a slap in the face from her staff. Even the deep space pilot who had whispered in her ear that he would give her 50 portions if she spent a night on his ship with him. Rey was starving but she wouldn't sell the one thing she had complete control over: her body. 

Rey wouldn't sell it but that didn't mean it couldn't be taken. 

She woke up in a sweat that night, still begging him to stop. A concerned BB-8 rolled into her quarters, having been patrolling the halls of the barracks, to see what was the matter. She smiled weakly and assured the astromech that it was just a dream. And that was all it was, she told herself. BB-8 stayed with her until she fell asleep again and long after. 

Finn brought it up the next morning as they ate their lunch rations on one of the green fields near the new base. BB-8 had told him that morning in the mess hall about that late night drama, worried for Rey and feeling he did not possess the understanding of humans necessary to be any help to Rey. She shrugged it off and took another sip of caf, telling him that it was just a bad dream and they happened. He looked unconvinced but allowed her her privacy, kissing her cheek and going back to their conversation about the holo Poe had shown them the night before. 

The nightmares didn't let up. It was as if they'd finally been unlocked from a dark part of Rey's mind where she'd shoved them and locked them in. She wondered whether her meeting of Ren, the feeling of being overpowered and helpless had triggered the return of the memories. She considered asking Luke but didn't want to explain what her nightmares were about and the possible connection. 

The difference had been that she had been able to fight Ren off. 

Rey had been picking apart an imperial cruiser when she'd been joined by another human scavenger. He was ten or so years older and much taller. Humans were rare on Jakku, and a human scavenger was rarer still. Most humans were pilots passing through or First Order contractors coming to buy parts for their latest ship. Even fascist regimes liked a bargain, it seemed. Rey paid no mind to the scavenger and focused on her task of extracting a part so it could be reused. Unkar paid more for working parts. The male scavenger focused on the wings. 

She made a habit of not engaging with any scavenger that she came across, for fear it would cause conflict. However, when she sat down and began to take a drink from her canteen, she found it empty. Rey cursed herself then and every day for weeks after that she hadn't steadied herself earlier in the day. If she had, she would have never had to speak to him. 

The male scavenger, she didn't know his name even now, spoke clearly and with charm. He plucked one of two canisters from his belt and offered it to Rey. Driven by her thirst, she took it and sniffed it to verify it was water before taking a gulp. That was all she took before handing it back. He didn't drink from the canister, he replaced it and drank from the second. 

His smile was welcoming to a young and lonely scavenger, unaware of what was about to happen to her. 

Rey had been lying with Finn in his cot one evening as they muttered sweet nothings and useless conversations across the pillows to each other. She was further and further lulled into sleep as Finn told her in a calming tone about the things he'd done that day, playing absentmindedly with her hair as he did so. She was able to put her nightmares behind her when she was with Finn. His smile burned away all evil when she was awake, chasing the male scavenger from her mind like a knight. Only when she was asleep did he return. 

It was almost funny to Rey how she noticed details now in her nightmares all these years later and wanted to scream at her younger self as she watched the events unwind again. Nobody drank from two canisters concurrently on Jakku, it was wasteful. Too overwhelmed by thirst she'd taken the offer, the rare show of kindness with both hands and continued her work in the hot midday sun. She successfully wrenched the part from the engine and put it in her satchel. Only as she finished storing it did she realise how woozy she felt, how her hands were shaking like how she imagined leaves did in the wind. 

Staring at her shaking fingers with blurring vision, Rey didn't look up until the male voice asked if she was okay and a hand was wrapped around her upper arm to pull her to the side of the ship so she could lean against it, her head spinning. The canister was pulled from his side and offered, and she drank willingly. When she thanked him, her words slurred. 

In the hot Jakku sun, with nobody for miles, it didn't really matter that Rey couldn't scream for help. 

At first, she thought it was just heat exhaustion and would pass quickly, but when her limbs stopped responding to her commands, Rey knew it was more than that. The male scavenger brushed his knuckles against her sallow cheekbones and told her she looked pale. When she went to smack his hand away, she found herself falling off balance and he caught her. 

Carelessly, tossing her back against the hot metal of the cruiser, he moved closer. Rey had known heat on Jakku, but nothing as stifling as the uncomfortable burn of his body pressed closer to hers as he pressed one hand on the ship beside her to box her in, cut her off from her staff laying against the ship. He spoke, but Rey's head felt like she was underwater and he was trying to speak through the liquid. His words were not what she remembered, she remembered his free hand beginning to push her vest aside. 

Rey still tried to fight back, attempting to speak around unresponsive lips and push limbs that would not follow commands against his body but he laughed darkly. He said something about enjoying the fire she had and simply pushed her closer to the ship with the hand moving from beside her head to enclose around her throat lightly. Hot tears rolled down her cheeks as he pulled her clothes aside to reveal what he had come for. 

Rey awoke with a shout, tangled in sheets and accidentally hitting Finn in the face in desperation to dispel her nightmares. 

"Ow, Rey! It's me!" Finn shouted as he rubbed his cheekbone, the former scavenger clenching her eyes tight as she sat up in bed and wrapped her arms around herself. He didn't touch her at first, waited a few seconds to slowly put a hand on her shoulder, moving slowly and giving her time to shove him off. Rey nearly did shrug him off but stopped herself, her eyes opening slowly when he spoke again. "Rey, it's me. I'm right here." He promised gently. 

Rey turned to looked at Finn in the dull glow of his bedside light. He must have switched it on when she'd woken him suddenly with her screaming. For the first time, she was glad that BB-8 was away with Poe on a mission or he would have come rolling into the room demanding to know what was going on. Finn smiled supportively and moved his hand to take hers, giving it a gentle squeeze. "You don't have to tell me if you don't want to." He started softly. "But you can, if you want to as well." Finn added. 

Rey smiled gently, tears beginning to dry on her cheeks as fresh ones sprung at her eyes. What had she done to be deserving of such a sweet and pure person in her life? She sniffed and wiped her face. "I keep having nightmares about something that happened on Jakku when I was 16. I don't know why it's happening to me now, but it's been happening since we came back from Starkiller." She explained, swallowing thickly. Finn looked expectant but not pushy, his fingers tangled with hers. "I was raped." 

And so she told him, she told him everything about that day. 

Rey told him about what he'd done to her, how he'd left her in a pile by the cruiser like a broken part and boarded his speeder. How she'd lay there for what seemed like hours and just cried, tugging her clothes over her flesh again to recover some of her stolen privacy. How she'd stumbled to her speeder and returned to her walker, using two of her precious water rations to scrub herself until her skin was red and raw in an effort to feel better, to feel less dirty. How she'd traded five half portions in the Outpost for the vile tasting concoction that would stave off any pregnancy, unlikely as it was in her malnourished state. 

Finn listened with a kind ear and a supportive look, his eyes only darkening a few times when she began detailing a particular sinister or upsetting part of her tale. He didn't look judgmental, or like he was pitying her. He just listened and waited until she was done. She hadn't ever told anyone about what had happened that day. Not even Plutt with his questioning looks when he saw her with the contraceptive concoction that next day, or the dead look in her eyes for the next week or two. Nobody had ever known until now. 

"You still like me don't you?" Rey began softly after her story ended and she allowed them both a few moments to process what they'd just said and heard. Finn lifted her hand to his lips and pressed a kiss there as a response. She'd heard jokes amongst the pilots and the scavengers all her life, known how women were treated when this happened to them. Nobody believed them, or they laughed at them. One of the many reasons she'd kept her mouth shut. Rey teared up as she spoke again. "I'd understand if you didn't, I guess." She whispered. 

Finn caught her eye and shifted closer, all but pulling her into his lap slowly, giving her all the time in the world to object. 

"I'd like you no matter what, Rey. But I want you to listen to me: You did nothing wrong. This doesn't make you any less of a person, and it doesn't make me like you less." He muttered into her hair as she let the tears slip down her cheeks. Rey clung to Finn gently, her fingers tangled in the shirt he slept in. "He was the bad guy here. He did this to you, and it just makes me angry to think about him walking around somewhere. Getting away with it." 

Rey sniffed, wondering where he was now. She'd never seen him again since that day. Was he still on Jakku? Was he somewhere else? Was he doing this to other girls like her? The thought made her tear a little harder, suddenly guilty that she hadn't done something on their behalf. Finn shushed her softly and kissed her hair, hanging along her shoulders and still slightly damp from her shower. "What if I never stop having these nightmares?" She whispered.

"Then..." Finn began as he lay down, pulling Rey with him and bringing the blankets over them both. It was cold on the base this time of year after all. Finn was used to staying in the cold, but Rey was not so used to it and was often found shivering in the night. Poe and Finn had already donated their blankets to keep her warm, especially when she caught her first cold and spent the week squeezing. "I'll be here each and every time to make sure that you're okay." He vowed softly as Rey tucked herself into his side, nodding gently and closing her eyes. Finn's hand wrapped around her shoulders and he kissed her forehead softly. 

That night, Rey found that the memories came for her again but the comfort she found in Finn dispelled the demons quickly, leaving her to sleep in peace.


End file.
